Jon Tseng

Glazed beets also lovely Cut into batons, put in pan with water up to halfway up. Drop a chunk of butter on top and a sprinkling of sugar Part-cover with a lid/cartouche (sp?). Cook until they are done. Remove lid and boil off the rest of the water until nicely glazed Munch J

Beetroot with blackcurrant jelly is a fantastic summer dish Make up some blackcurrant jelly with half the stipulated water. Slice the beets and layer them in a mould; top up with jelly, leave to set and turn out. NB must use non-vinegared beets for this one serve with smoked salmon, horseradish, sour cream and other eastern european accountrements J

hear hear for inyourpocket excellent and up to date guides J

do you cut the rind off first? have only had miserable failure trying to slice thru pork skin at home j

Pork belly rocks! Normally we have it hongshao (braised/steamed) at home with soy sauce, wine and other goodies which turn it a luscious ruby colour. Also nice braised with little bits of cornmeal (mi) with it Have noticed too the inexorable rise of the pork belly - was at Smiths of Smithfield a couple of months back and it seemed to be every other main flying out the hatch. Pig belly is indeed the new lamb shank (which was, in turn, the new duck confit) Having said this its difficult to get it right in western kitchens - melting flesh and crispy skin. Either the flesh is slightly dessicated or the skin a bit chewy. Even Gordon Ramsay Claridges has managed to muck it up. Still need to figure out how the cantonese get their roast belly so crunchy without fail - is it a hotter oven or just lots of salt or a pre-dried rind? J

was the FG de-veined? has it as part of the FG three ways a while back, and was surprised they hadn't sounds fun J

How do you find it compares to other Eastern European grub? Found that the ciorba di burta was fun but after that I got a bit bored of //another// 200g of grilled fillet. For my reckoning (better first): Polish Czech Romanian Haven't been to Hungary, but have heard it is good too J

Surely woof should be dogfish?

Looks like worms alla fiorentina to me :-)

I was wondering about this today actually - what does a sauce bring to a dish? Either i) moistening it/changing the tecture ii) as a vehicle for another flavour. Although most dishes (certainly mains) seem to be sauced, brothed, coulised, jused or nage'd nowadays, I'm not convinced - based on the above criteria - its really necessary all of the time. If you have a perfectly done piece of meat which is moist enough in itself, and you don't necessary want to chuck in another flavour (or you do it via a garnish rather than a sauce) why not serve it unsauced? J PS on the tiddly dots question I find them irritating because often the sauce/reduction used isn't sufficiently intense, so you can't really taste it. I suppose it makes the dish look purty though...

If I want a bit of kick with minimal effort nothing beats colemans Normally from a jar - used the powdered many moons ago but haven't seen it for years J

Chinese have various dried mossy/seaweedy things At New Year we had a special moss/licchen thing. Can't remember its name. Black. Very fine but all tangled up like a beard. Pig to wash it - we don't use water. Soaked and rinsed it in oil and teased out the little bits of dirt. Then cooked as part of soup. Dunno if anyone know more about this stuff. J

Rhodes in the Square?

Rick Bayliss Frontera grill? Only other Mex haute I can think of Actually there's another one at the back of my head... can't remember. Chap called Mark. Restaurant name includes Coyote. Can anyone job my memory? J

Second black forest gateau i believe there is a recipe in Simon Hopkinson's The Prawn Cocktail Years another one are the sponge cakes filled with strawberry jam and whipped cream you used to be able to get in the freezer at the supermarket. they used to be ubiquitous but had a look recently and none to be found J

That rules out Fifteen then...

Chez Bruce... or stagg inn? That price point for a michelin star would cut the field down quite a lot - can't think of many stars with six quid starters More importantly how does fillet on the bone work? Haven't seem it done this way before. Anyone know what goes? J

Thats fascinating. Why does it cook for so long? What happens to it after three ours? What effect does the sous-vide have? J

You can whip ganache? sounds interesting how does it work? J

Very much the hard method - put a couple of teaspoons of coulis on a small piece of clingfilm; wrapped it up tight like a beggers purse to the liquid coulis was squeezed into a ball; tied the top off with one of those wire tie things you get with sandwich bags. Yes freezes fine - sometimes a bit fudgy but solid enough to dip. Process works the same with just about any liquid (have done it with OJ too). I think I was trying to figure out how to make liquid centre liquer chocolates at the time (later found out it was something to do with moulds, crystallising and lots of cornflour which I never quite figured out) Mousse of course holds its shape so much less hassle! Maybe another suggestion for a smooth coating would be to double dip - ie once when its frozen, then again when the centre has thawed out. Of course you'd then end up with a battle-tank like chocolate layer outside, but maybe this could be livened up (eg dip in white first then dark, or embed it with bits of nut to add to the inevitable crunch...) If you don't want a mousse maybe try a raspberry cream (folding coulis into whipped cream to taste). There's some good ones in Gordon Ramsay's Desert book. For other raspberry deserts sandwiching raspberries/raspberry cream between chocolate wafers is quick and easy - make the wafers marbled by spreading out some white chocolate first, letting set, spreading out dark on top. Providing its done on a smooth surface you get a wonderfully glossy/marbled effect (I think this is in the Michel Roux book) cheerio J

Could you try freezing the mousse in balls and then dipping in chocolate? I've done this successfully with raspberry coulis; dunno how mousse reacts to freezing - would depend on the recipe. Actually given the contents of the average frozen desert cabinet in the supermarket (mousse, pavolva, gateau etc.) I suspect frozen mousse would hold quite well cheerio J

Now that's a good idea! The problem I always have with bought is it rises beautifully but tastes of margarine whereas the problem with homemade is that it makes like a pancake but tastes of butter! J

Strawberry juice Stick straws in bowl, cover with clingfilm, set on top of pan of boiling water for an hour or so Drain of the scrummy juice and chill - ideal as a light summer soup, syrup, slurp &tc J

I think La Trouvaille in London does a lavender sauce with lamb I'm sure others will corroborate J

Melting chocolate Heating baked beans